Passport-size photos, applications, visiting the ticket office. Yeah, the lack of monthly caps on Oyster baffles me. New York itself may have an excuse to keep the faregates: its trains are very crowded, so peak-hour inspections may not be feasible. I have no idea why Stockholm has fare barriers. This should tell you what happens when the rich west adopts that system. However, what Ive encountered more resistance about is the idea that people should just be able to walk onto a bus or train. ERG was the company that designed HKs card (but they went bust and London managed to steal this tech for almost nothing) and were give the contract to implement a similar system for Sydney. The main feature of those East Asian systems is that travel, even without any discount, is far cheaper than in the west. For local operation (bus, tram, regional trains) they use vehicles which contain a passenger counting system, counting the number of people getting off and on. Also its fare gates are an awful design to boot. The Anglosphere does a shockingly poor job on this. Transport for London cannot give any advice with regard to completing the forms or on how you should proceed. Even today way too many stations on the Iida or Yonesaka lines while too few on the Kagoshima area ones, the urbanised Ou line areas or the Yosan line. We are seeing more an more examples of clients being Is there any country where ethnic minority which is poorer than rest of the population is not disproportionately inprisoned? If so, you will be instructed to submit a plea by post. The American moral panic about fare evasion regrettably goes far beyond New York. DMU branch lines as political patronage are a waste! The German one is to make it easy to follow the law and then use enforcement to not make it so easy to break it. I am a bit sheepish to admit that for all the years I benefitted from the subsidised Carte Orange monthly card (now Navigo) in Paris, I never knew who subsidised it. Probably best to seek actual legal advice from a solicitor than take advice from an Internet forum where your criminal record is at stake. We base such a policy on international examples wherein commuting costs are also born by employers, the state, or a combination of employer, state and commuter. In talking to Americans about fare evasion, I have found that they are generally receptive to the idea of minimizing revenue loss net of collection costs. It also occurs when Thoroughly recommend! > I more or less agree but then if we compare Greater Paris with Tokyo, the former with very affordable transit and the latter with more expensive transit, then clearly it doesnt always follow, ie. Viewed through a regional city perspective JNR was bad, the neglect of infill alone, I counted 15+ new stations on the Sanyo mainline alone all of them getting 2000 riders a day, and only a minority where in Hanshin area! Pendeltg is the proper S-Bahn / RER after all and that started in 1968. They Your argument against which kind of trips that are induced by marginal price costs of 0, just makes no sense. In the West inevitably it is exploited until the pips squeak . were honest, kind, warm and efficient. Yeah, better than they used to be, but still expensive and some conditional travel. The most common example of fare evasion involves the use of another persons Oyster Card to get the benefit of reduced or free travel. it is clear that you dont have any experience of very well run transit city, such as in East Asia, where rich and poor regularly alike use transit. BART has a three-pronged problem that it is dealing with concerning fare-evasion. WebSo fare evasion is a civil offence not a criminal one. At the end of the day they are more affected by a shitty public environment than the wealthy who can retreat to their upper middle class bubbles and not have to deal with the antisocial. Indeed if you can get most of your passengers/city reaching two yeses then your casual evasion will be well below a level worth caring about.. 70% of department 77 Seine-et-Marne) and has huge forests and national parks (eg. because it is so easy to do. The difference being that the far right sees this as a reason to hate transit and the far left as a reason to support it. Most people will pay, one way regardless. Development London, Guidance in providing supporting documents. It certainly helps the use of the Metro/RER, keeps car use low (you need to be slightly insane to try to drive in Paris; I did for the first year . 27, 2019 But thats Fare Evasion 201. Or his father Lord, Baron Rees-Mogg? Which brings us to casuals, Casual fare evasion is a thing done by normal people, regardless of age/money/class. The travelling public in the East seems a lot more happy with their experience than the travelling public you refer to in the West. The economic-rationalist argument is that this competition will force all players, especially those wickedly inefficient state bodies, to improve their customer service focus (just listen to Jean-Pierre Farandous statement on attaining the new job: pure management speak while covertly threatening the unions). In New York City, a spate of attention has come recently to policing Americas largest transit system. Why is pay as you go more popular?? This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged. These systems arent put in for a whim the bump in revenue from gating has been well documented otherwise they would not have pushed so hard on covering more stations. Transit, even expensive transit, is nearly always affordable as is. (LogOut/ @borners Webtfl fare evasion settle out of court; tfl fare evasion settle out of court. The simply DO NOT have the money to pay so threats of fines are also useless against them., For the LARGER category of habituals though, its either because: Do not send or request any private messages for any reason. Hi! Efficiency is usually both environmental and fair. The public transport system provides a certain level of constant service and a monthly pass is a right to use this service. Maybe concession fares are needed for the very poor, but the costs of even expensive transit pale in comparison to the cost of even heavily subsidized car ownership nevermind accurately priced car ownership. The commuting trips are the predictable part of that persons transportation. I have an appeal against conviction for fare evasion by TFL tomorrow, do you have any advice? My tickets were purchased six weeks in advance and were second class non-reserved and off-peak and this is supposed to be the cheapest option. On the same principle, cities and states can discount fares on buses and trains. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. The German-speaking world, as irrational as Britain and France about urban crime rates that are far lower than they were a generation ago, still treats the train and bus rider as a law-abiding customer unless proven otherwise. cheaper transit promoting sprawl. Why? They did an excellent job and she gave me all the information Ineeded. 800851655). Which makes cheating extremely easy. This is bad practice, especially for passengers who prefer to refill at a ticketing machine rather than at home or on their phone with an app, since it means passengers visit the ticketing machines more often, requiring the agency to buy more to avoid long lines. If an inspector (conductor) finds you without a ticket, you either pay a fine or get kicked off. @Alon That is the sensible way to do it. I find it quite plausible that ordinary people actually find fairness in pricing according to cost very attractive and well fair. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns. It also wants to improve efficiency in order to procure a better rail service for Ile-de-France residents without increasing operating costs. Anyway: the breakeven point for a zone 1-3 ticket is 48: the monthly is 158.30 with a travelcard, the peak single fare is 3.30. Whats the worst that can happen with open access? Thisll be relatively broad because Im in a hotel bar in Berlin, not at home with all my notes, but generally the London experience is that fare evasion can be divided into two categories: However, this really isnt about revenue or enforcement approaches or fare levels. Taken to court by TFL for fare evasion under contrary to byelaw 17. Is that recent? WebFare evasion is a criminal offence and you may be prosecuted. It takes tourists and business travellers to Gatwick and Luton airports. As I pointed out in a recent post, Melun which is on the other side of the river Seine to Fontainebleu about 45km from central Paris, has 50,000 residents at density 5,000/km2. As to the rest of your post, it is pure econometric thinking of the kind that gives me a headache. Country.From .To.Month pass%av earnings And the chances of being killed by police will be even lower. Because I actually believe in trying to have a reality based discussion heres the densities per hectare as of 2014 in the Atlas of Urban Expansion. In 2016, it [Paris] has been ranked as the best public transport system in the world by the ITDP with 100 percent of people in the city of Paris having an easy access to rapid transportation, ahead of 26 other international cities (including London, New York City and Tokyo). Whats really at play is a class war issue. Its only wasteful if people are taking unnecessary rush hour trips, but even with the pricing of Zurich or the outer fare zones in Stockholm, the monthly pass is mostly subsidizing off-peak trips, when theres spare capacity. It seems a bit of a wasted effort otherwise, eh?, Oh, should of added, that this is why when youre designing your roaming checks youre really looking for how you can MAXIMISE the number of people that saw that check happen. I more or less agree but then if we compare Greater Paris with Tokyo, the former with very affordable transit and the latter with more expensive transit, then clearly it doesnt always follow, ie. By the same token, the issue of fare evasion should be viewed from the lens of revenue loss, rather than that of crime and disorder. Its because the software can only remember so many trips, right? There needs to be some power behind the ticket-writer. CrossRail was first proposed in 1948. $50 for a week pass, $127 for monthly, $1500 annual. In contrast, the unlicensed churro vending is more a problem of city and state regulations making it too onerous to sell food, hence Jessica Ramoss proposal to lift the cap on food carts. I dont know if the EUs Open Access is involved but this wilfully stupid experiment has plenty of evidence to suggest where it ends. Probably not, in that I dont think these French companies that operate in other countries bring their bad habits back home (eg. WebTransit Fare Evasion. WebFare Evasion Solicitors Transport For London (TFL) has an aggressive prosecution policy when it comes to Fare Evasion. When videos of aggressive arrests surfaced, protesters demonstrated against the police presence by jumping turnstiles en masse. Londons fare capping system is weekly rather than monthly there are no monthly passes, and all fares are set at very high levels. This skewed thinking has meant that substantial financial burdens are being placed upon commuters (not to mention the public at large) whilst other beneficiaries of commuting (employers) are not contributing to its financing. 2019-11-14 - 01:24 Henry. In todays Guardian. Again, counter logical. Is it a shorter trip? And Ive never seen a normal cop using a rifle. Tear down these faregates. Hope that isnt a dark omen. fremont hospital deaths; what happened to tropical tidbits; chris herren speaking fee; boracay braids cultural appropriation; tfl fare evasion settle out of court. WebTransport for London (TfL) is strengthening its measures to combat fare evasion, which costs Londoners millions of pounds a year and is an issue the Mayor is determined to tackle. Even if the OP did have full details written in the post, nothing is linking the OP's post to the guy showing up in court. Despite your notions, the planners in HK and Singapore etc are prioritising the transit aspects with financial performance being secondary. German railways has worked over the past decade or longer? Based on a five-day work week, the average month has between 22 and 23 work days. I read that even Japan (an extreme case obviously) wants to blame Chinese immigrants for a rise in crime (linked to criminal syndicates, they claim) which may or may not be true but reveals the cultural attitude behind the phenomenon. The governor is proposing to spend more on fare enforcement than the MTA can ever hope to extract. Beyond population density, efficiency is an important reason why transit is so cheap in East Asia. *I already hate the newer online ticketing and information systems. Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. @Sassy: Japan has a norm of subsidized commuting costs (mostly employer subsidized, but the amount of government subsidy increases as income increases since it comes as a tax benefit), and while its cool that people can and do commute via Shinkansen from exurbs over 100km from the city center, I dont think that is behavior the government should promote.. So, you have to swipe-in AND swipe-out. By accepting all cookies, you agree to our use of cookies to deliver and maintain our services and site, improve the quality of Reddit, personalize Reddit content and advertising, and measure the effectiveness of advertising. Ireland..DroghedaDublin.116..3% See In re 3M Bair Hugger Litigation, 924 N.W.2d 16, 24 (Minn. App. The most urbanised zone is Paris + Petite Couronne: 6,695,233 (2011) on 761km2 = 8,786/km2. And Herbert, arent you German? Germany..Eberswalde.Berlin.1204%. In his acclaimed book on the creation of modern Australia, Fatal Shore, Robert Hughes noted that this nation was founded as a dumping ground for criminals whom the motherland ejected nevertheless rapidly turned into one of the most law-abiding nations on earth. However, again one should compare the compact arrangement of Ile de France versus what happens with Japan & Tokyos laissez-faire development policies. Oh, and the new companies will of course order the cheapest rolling stock they can find which will mean Chinese, which in turn will reduce the profitability and scale etc of Alstom and Siemens (which arent allowed to merge to effectively compete against the likes of even more massively state-subsidised China rail companies). Andy Byford, New York Citys transit president, has maintained that fares are crucial in improving rider experience. Precisely. Regardless, its S$120 per month without discounts, whereas the longest single-ride fare is $2.08 (link 1, link 2), for a breakeven point of 58 rides a month for trips longer than about 40 km. Transport For London (TFL) has an aggressive prosecution policy when it comes to Fare Evasion. Thelawyer who dealt with my caseput me at ease straight aware and was professional throughout my consultation. I will try to keep this as concise as poss - I recently got into trouble on a bus when I accidentally used my boyfriend's 16+ zip Oyster instead of mine (I have an 18+ student one). They immediately made me feel at ease and left no stone unturned in order to achieve a successful conclusion to mycase. That would move most adults onto annual passes. Claiming the Commute requires employers to pay for half of the commuting costs of their workforce that pertain to (more environmentally-friendly) modes of transport. In most of the US, as you know, we need better service more than we need cheaper fares. Revenue enforcement and prosecutions policy. This setup works at palatial East Asian stations, but a cheap cut-and-cover Continental European station gets overwhelmed when a million Parisians all descend on a handful of stations to celebrate. How did you come up with M16s?? You can add NZ to that list, so it is a perfect correlation with immigrant nations. Except of course it only delays the inevitable building of proper transit, which delay causes an entirely different level of cost escalation, not to mention opportunity cost. No one will jump a fare gate 10 feet in front of uniformed police officer. [You double-posted; I deleted the shorter version.]. WebFare evasion is a strict liability offence, meaning it does not matter if an individual intended to evade paying a fare or it was an innocent mistake, the mere fact that you failed to produce a valid ticket when requested for your journey, is sufficient for the network provider to take Court Action against you. 2) Casual France..tampe..Paris68 .2% So if someone rides a King County Bus, then a Sound Transit train, both Sound Transit and King County get money. For example, some fringe party that wont make it to the Abgeordnetenhaus has election posters promising 30 monthlies, down from 86 today; BVG fare revenue was 766.3M in 2019, and the reduction, around 500M/year, is similar in scope to the size of the ongoing investment plan, around 2 km of city center subway or 3 km of suburban subway; the Berlin map I just posted has 24 km of new tunnel inside the Ring (ex-S21 bits already under construction) and 32 outside, so fare reduction subsidies are in competition with such expansion and should not be pursued. At lot depends on whether one looks at the public transport system in isolation or as part of the whole transport system or part of society in general. monthly passes is that be encouraging heavy rather than occasional (mixed with biking and walking) use of transit, it encourages large geographical sprawl. Then the S-Bahn probably gets a lot of subsidies at least outside of the trunk areas. You meet an interrogation window that demands what time you want to travel, or they only show a single service (Ouigo etc). Heavy policing, with militarised civil police carrying M16s, has so reduced the criminality and incarceration rate in the US! Do you think the econometric, austerity-minded policies w.r.t. The flat fare is not really applicable to American cities, except possibly the Bay Area on BART. To the passengers, this friction is invisible I buy tickets on the BVG app but theyre equally valid on the S-Bahn, even on S-Bahn-only trips. In the context of most US metros, I think looking at transit fares in isolation is a mistake. That maybe the US its not in the UK. Ill admit my attitude is very conditioned by direct experience. We operate as a form of "legal triage" where commenters can guide posters towards resolving issues themselves or towards an appropriate professional. Of course the Oyster card tech (copied from Hong Kongs Octopus) could have fed the Brits propensity to burden their fare systems with all kinds of conditional time and zoning regulations that would have allowed them to painlessly pump up the cost to the customer. Based on the statistics received with those means, the general pot gets distributed among the different operators. Much less a whole restaurant. Whilst I thoroughly enjoyed my travels in both countries, I was astounded by the cost of regional trains and bus and tube transport in the UK. Because the higher your passenger-to-visible-check ratio is, the lower your casual evasion will be.. The upshot is that successful policies regarding fare collection in (for example) Germany are obscure in the United States even more than policies regarding wonkier transportation issues like train frequency. Unfortunately, the problem of indifference to monthlies on urban rail is common around the Anglosphere. In Paris on the RER I cant tell I believe its three figures of which the first is a 1. What a wonderful system! And that should coincide with a transition of everything to a paid model, with app-based day/weekly passes. Let me tell you many working class people like law and order and a good public realm. That is true in HK and Singapore which arent really inexpensive city-states but have transit use as a priority over road use. Japans railway privatization and broken up was also said as for the purpose of crushing railway union. In the summer, Governor Cuomo announced a new initiative to hire 500 cops to patrol the subway. It is $12.40 to go from Fremont to SFO (a 30 mile drive). Fare enforcement should be done with POP alone, by unarmed civilian inspectors, as in Berlin. Its a proxy for lawlessness, for police racism, for public safety, for poverty. Moving the gates upstream is a consideration. https://www.traveller.com.au/traveller-letters-campari-spritz-is-far-superior-to-aperol-spritz-h1jm5q The entire Tokyo metro area has a population density of 2642 people per sq km, whereas Paris has a population density of 1010 people per sq km. Im not sure how much they were promoting free transit (I only browsed it) but their predominant conclusion about UK policy on fares and costs was solid. TfL will only be getting costs in court (120), they will be making probably twice that setting out of court and will do less work to get it or even more if people offer to pay I mention it because it brings up awkward issues of those subsidies: do they extend to these private entities? Youll say that one doesnt rule out the other, but it seems that effectively it does. This report puts forward a relatively simple Claim the Commute scheme as a solution to this problem. I was facedwith the prospect of receiving a hefty fine and a criminal record. If theyre buying a book, theyre buying it near the office or at home, not in the middle. Please see our reviews at the bottom of this page and contact our office on 020 7837 3456 for further details and to make an appointment. In cases where longer term avoidance of fares in suspected, for example using someone elses reduced fare Oyster Card over a period of time, Transport for London (TFL) may want to interview you under caution. And its part of the largest train franchise in Britain, Govia Thameslink. Makes the second point much less important, even to those minorities (those minorities are much less likely to be subject to this treatment in France versus the US). A different argument against monthly passes is that be encouraging heavy rather than occasional (mixed with biking and walking) use of transit, it encourages large geographical sprawl. There really are no excuses to adopt gold-standard solutions from elsewhere, though it is depressingly common in US transit, but also many European countries. My single ticket to Windermere cost about $A200; by comparison, I can travel from Sydneys Central Station to Bomaderry on NSWs South Coast (a three hour journey, as is Windermere from London) for $2.50 on my seniors Opal Card. If you want to do an apples to apples comparison go find satellite data and use it. 2) Is the service worth the relative economic price to me? There are likely to be cultural differences, so it is possible that in most American cities, it makes sense to have some POP officials. You dont need to convince me that British fares are out of control. Its the nature of the mindset that believes it can avoid spending real money by improving efficiency (at someone elses expense/convenience, often far into the future) to think this way. Its now got the stage where in London trains are much more lightly loaded on Mondays and Fridays. It is over 25-year-old technology by now. 3) Lost revenue from passengers avoiding system due to crime can be inferred via a safety survey. With regard to other countries in the Anglosphere, I think Singapore and London actually do have monthlies: Singapore has the Adult Monthly Travel Card allowing unlimited use of bus and train services for a month islandwide, for $120. The whole situation was resolved very quickly in just over a week and much to my relief I received a warning for forgetting to tap in, rather than a prosecution and a criminal record. HL February 2021, I highly recommend BSB solicitors, they are professional and responsive. In a world trying to coax car drivers out of their cars, or to use them less, youve got to make the system frictionless and fair, or more than fair. Doing this by encouraging wasteful use and monthly passes makes no sense (and often the logic behind it is flawed and empirically incorrect). Also, it was valid on everything 24/7 (I understand the rough equivalent pass in London isnt actually valid for weekend use! A Pew Research study (documented here: https://www.inquirer.com/transportation/septa-bus-fee-transfer-poverty-transit-pew-study-20190724.html ) notes that Philadelphia has one of the highest rates not just of working poor but of residents with limited or no access to banks and internet connections. I understand why a transfer station should look like this, but Singapore has these enormous complexes with mezzanines even at non-transfer stations. I hired BSB firm to represent me in a TfL fare case in October 2018. WebThank you for your request received by Transport for London (TfL) on 14th March 2022 asking for information about fare evasion. OK, youve nit-picked one thing from that report. Geez. Thank you so much! Often such pay as you go systems are implemented to cover the fact that the product (aka the service level) sucks. However Sydney had a horrendously complex British style system, and worse buses and ferries were different (and it was intended to integrate everything), and eventually they couldnt do it under the contract constraints (it was part of the reason they went bust). Oh, and by the way, only Singapore citizens and permanent residents are eligible to apply. This is how the Taipei busses work for example. Contrast with Japan which even with almost entirely privatized rail has heavily regulated fares. And you really have no excuse for not understanding this as I explained it all, here: Webthe district court abused its discretion in denying his motion to amend the complaint to add a claim for punitive damages. And on the other hand, by the relatively frictionless Paris and French system. Unlicensed vending is fine, I dont have a problem with the churro venders of New York. BTW Japanese policy on rail operations probably has something to do with the almost US$400 billion (yes billion) debt the government or its various proxies still carries from the privatisation of JR. Also on the geographic fact that they cant have too many people owning and using cars (in Japan you have to prove you have parking before you are allowed to even own a car; in Singapore there is a 150% tariff on cars). As to your last para, that is even more econometric thinking that shows how warped it gets. Cash payments subject them to a 50 penalty for the first boarding of a trip and a _$2.50_ penalty for any transfers needed to complete the journey. I would wholly recommend BSB Solicitors for anyone looking for help with fare evasion cases. If you through more honest pricing for the actual demand can avoid both things such as the Second Avenue Subway or horrible overcrowding that is a very good thing. Fare evasion is a criminal offenceand you may be prosecuted. Fares are integrated between buses and trains (which is more than I can say for, say, London), and theres a schedule for fare by distance. Writing a letter of representations offering to settle out of court so as to prevent prosecution. If subsidized transit leads to people moving further out and leading more car oriented lives, it could even increase transportation costs, as people saved money on housing by moving to a further out area, but end up needing a car for many non-commute trips. Thats your kind of economic efficiency. This could probably be achieved without putting in more money into the system if rush hour pricing, no or modest bulk discounts, and higher prices for long trips were introduced. Does anyone higher up the food chain than a churro vendor gets tackled to the ground by police over this? London generally gives off an impression of treating everyone who is not a Daily Mail manager as a criminal. Mistakes happen; Ive accidentally fare-dodged in Berlin twice, only realizing the error at the end of the trip. Not at all equivalent. Whats a little food poisoning now and then? Of course fare gates need manning so outside of the busiest stations fare gating is often a peak time only operation. There are no marginal costs close to zero in cities close to capacity at rush hour (such as New York, Tokyo, London, or Seoul), instead, those marginal trips have gigantic marginal cost if the solution is something like the Second Avenue Subway (or alternatively a horrible overcrowded travel experience). Theres a bunch of other stuff I could go into about fine levels vs fare levels vs chance of being caught, value of ticket sales at airports, balancing the disruption of checks against frequency, the value of uniform vs non-uniform etc. I would recommend them to anyone facing a similar situation. Solano Verde Water District. For the far right and the far left, transit is a social service for poor people rather than a general transportation service in the United States. Why would a woman want to take a bus or train when she might have to watch somebody pee? policy. If this is the case, follow the instructions carefully. People do not take mass transit at rush-hour if they can help it. No doubt designed and enforced by genuine elites who never intend to use the Underground themselves, except for an annual photo-op. So does London https://tfl.gov.uk/fares/how-to-pay-and-where-to-buy-tickets-and-oyster/travelcards-and-group-tickets. Most if not all Parisians love the Metro and consider it theirs. To Posters (it is important you read this section), Tell us whether you're in England, Wales, Scotland, or NI as the laws in each are very different. In New York, the SBS system uses proof of payment (POP), but passengers still have to validate fares at bus stops, even if they already have paid, for example if they have a valid monthly pass. But what is the objective? its the poor who suffer from more from dirty streets and parks. But all rail travellers would. As for cheap trips outside rush-hour, that is exactly what I am arguing for instead of bulk-discounts (that make the marginal cost 0 in rush hour).